During an arrest for allegedly using a counterfeit $20 bill, Chauvin pressed his knee into Floyd's neck for nearly nine minutes as his victim begged him to stop, said he couldn't breathe and lost consciousness. Floyd was later declared dead. The image of a Black man gasping for breath under the knee of a white officer rekindled a nationwide racial justice movement last summer.
The delay in seating jurors for Chauvin's trial — which is scheduled to begin at the end of the month — stems from a dispute about whether he should face a third-degree murder charge. That crime carries a lesser sentence than the second-degree murder charge Chauvin also faces, but may also be easier to prove.
Third-degree murder was dismissed from the case back in October, and it seemed to be off the table until Friday, when a state appeals court revived it. Now, with Chauvin planning to take that decision to Minnesota's supreme court, prosecutors are seeking to delay jury selection.
At a hearing Monday morning, Assistant Attorney General Matthew Frank, the lead prosecutor in the case, questioned "the very authority of the lower court to operate when there is still an appeal pending."
He said trial Judge Peter Cahill won't have jurisdiction over the case until the appeals court issues a final judgment on its Friday ruling. The appellate court can't do that unless both sides agree not to appeal, or until a 30-day deadline has expired, he said.
Until then, the appeal is pending because "both parties still have the right to seek further review," Frank said.
Chauvin's attorney, Eric Nelson, said he planned to appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court by Tuesday morning.
"It is not our intent to cause delay," he said. "However, I feel I have an obligation to my client and other criminal defendants to do so."
Nelson said Judge Cahill couldn't yet rule on whether to reinstate the third-degree murder charge, but added that he thought the lower court had jurisdiction over the rest of the case and could move forward with motions in limine and jury selection.
Frank argued that even jury selection should remain on hold until they knew whether third-degree murder would be one of the many potential convictions, but Judge Cahill called that argument "a bit tenuous." It isn't unusual in a homicide case to add in charges just before the jury goes into deliberations, he said.
While Judge Cahill planned to hold off on deciding whether to reinstate the third-degree murder charge, he said during Monday's hearing that he thought he could go forward with jury selection that day.
But after a recess, Frank announced he would "seek further direction from the appellate court" about whether jury selection could continue while the appeal is pending.
Then Judge Cahill said he would wait until a ruling came down, and encouraged Frank to call the appellate court and seek a writ "to stop us from going forward."
The potential jurors who'd gathered at the courthouse were dismissed for the day.
The third-degree murder charge has been controversial since May, when the local Hennepin County Attorney's Office first filed a complaint against Chauvin. Critics decried the third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter charges as too weak.
Days later, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison took over the case and added a second-degree murder charge against Chauvin.
Second-degree murder carries a 40-year sentence, compared with 25 years for third-degree murder. But it also requires a finding that the defendant was committing a felony — in Chauvin's case, assault — that led to the death of the victim. That could be more difficult to prove, since Nelson plans to argue his client was an on-duty police officer and that Floyd was resisting arrest when he was killed.
A third-degree murder conviction requires a finding that Chauvin acted recklessly. While it carries a lesser sentence, prosecutors likely want an array of possible verdicts available to the jury.
When Judge Cahill dismissed the third-degree murder charge in October, he found that Chauvin's actions didn't meet the relevant state law's requirement that a defendant endangered other people besides the victim.
Prosecutors sought to reinstate the third-degree murder charge last month, citing a recent change in the law that stemmed from another police shooting case.
Officer Mohamed Noor — who was convicted of killing Justine Ruszczyk, a woman who startled him when she knocked on the window of his squad car — appealed his third-degree murder conviction, arguing his case didn't meet the requirements for the charge because he "directed his actions at a particular person." An appellate court rejected that argument, finding Minnesota state law "does not require that more than one person be put in jeopardy."
Prosecutors in the Floyd case tried to use that ruling to reinstate the third-degree murder charge against Chauvin. But Judge Cahill found the Noor decision wasn't binding, and he denied the request in February.
The state appealed, and on Friday an appellate court sided with prosecutors, finding that the district court erred in not applying Noor because "a precedential opinion of this court is binding authority upon its filing."
It is unclear whether Chauvin's appeal will delay the trial. During Monday's hearing, both sides stressed that they were ready and eager to try the case.
Nelson noted they still had a three-week window before opening statements are scheduled to begin on March 29, and that the state's high court might not agree to hear his appeal.
"We could file a petition today, and the Supreme Court could act very quickly, and then we're either right back here or up at the Supreme Court," he said.
--Editing by Adam LoBelia.
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